Of course, the first thing on my mind is to say Merry Christmas to all our friends, family and customers on such a glorious day.
I’ll start with a small fishing report from this past week. We were able to have a few guests in our sleepers as day houses before another round of mother nature showing us, she is the one in control. We had a group of 6 that called out of the blue as the arrangements they had made had fallen through.. John and his crew used florida and montana for the day. They only got a few fish with one or 2 21 inchers.. John did have a pandemonic and were seeing fish all day but trying to entice them to bite was tough. They packed it in about a hour after dark.
Robert and his 2 buddies fished old minnesota. They managed 3 nice solid fish, Robert said they had to leave just as the bite was picking up. I headed out to turn the heat off and gather the generators.
Lonnie Adam and Greg came up for the day, they fished old minnesota on wednesday. Adam did land a 32 inch pike. They also caught a couple smaller walleyes
Every year things are different yet are the same. This grand lake freezes, cracks, moves before she settles down a bit. I would say we had close to 11 inches of ice before we got our first wet heavy snow close to 7 inches followed by another 6 or 7 more. This slowed down the ice making. It also caused quite a bit of extra work on all the equipment and resort plans around the lake.
Now getting back to this week when everyone was making their decision what to do. Again, mother nature decided let’s throw in some lite snow followed by high winds for 3 days. Mys well fill in all the ice roads, cause some big drifts around the houses and customers vehicles on the lake.
We had a repeat group of customers coming in friday afternoon, so Jonny boy and I were out in all most white out conditions getting 3 houses ready for their arrival. Once we had them all checked in Jonny boy got working on the red baron again as she still would not run right, and we would be needing that big v plow asap .
We decided it had to be the fuel pump so the gas tank would need to come off. I had a fuel pump that was a little bit shorter but maybe it would work. Working under a old parachute with the torpedo heater and temps below – 10 somehow jonny boy was able to accomplish such a feat out in the driveway. I was surprised to see how much crud was in the tank with what gas was in there broken down. That had to be the culprit. He also found 2 wires that were in need of repair.
Once we got some gas back in her jonny boy fired her up. She revved up fine. we warmed her up and jonny boy took her out just in time to run her down the off-shoot road to our houses which was now completely blown in. One pass down and back and again the red baron coughed and sputtered. At least we now knew it was a fuel delivery problem.
Jonny boy headed home for the night, and we would again tackle it in the morning. I got the dreaded call around 1 am that one of the furnaces in colorado were not working. Once I got out there Rob and I were able to figure it out and get some heat going again. The regulator is freezing up. She will need a new one.
Now this is becoming a long read. We got a new inline fuel filter, plus another new pump that was the right one. Again, the inline filter seemed to clear it up but after one pass yesterday on Hillmans main road she sputters again. Jonny boy dropped the tank again, replaced the pump and filter. As I helped button up the tank jonny boy said if this did not work maybe we should put her in the burn pile. She fired up and for the next 3 hours into the dark Jonny boy helped buddy Hillman reopen the main road out to 2 miles any way. Let’s not forget the red baron also came in with a flat rear tire so that needs to be addressed asap.
I spent most of yesterday in blue thunder cleaning up all the drifting around the houses. I did Spend a little time with our guest which are some of the nicest people you could ever meet, they even have grama out there. They also invited me for their shrimp boil. I love shrimp but I had already planned dinner with the hammer so I did not make it out there. They were up to 11 fish I be leave with a few misses thrown in plus one big fish that got off.
I’m headed out there in a bit to say good morning and let them know the main road is open if they need to come to shore. The winds finely layed down, so we have a day and a half to prep everything for the week ahead.
I would say most of the resorts are either open or opening tomorrow morning. Off road travel with a wheelhouse would more than likely be impossible as the winds have drifted the snow and packed it hard enough you can walk on top of it. The old v plow will be huge this year.
This Christmas I’m so thankful jonny boy is here to help his old man the first part of the season, then I have friends, family and possibly a couple part time people that will be helping me on such a grand lake that owes us nothing.